Building A Skew List

I haven't talked a lot about skew lists. The idea behind skew lists is to do the opposite of balance a list. For example you can skew high DEF, you put as much high DEF stuff into a list as possible. Most lists try to do stuff, skew lists instead say to your opponent - can you deal with this? If they can't you win and if they can you generally lose. There are a lot of different ways you can skew a list, the most common is probably high DEF in Khador. Where you take Kayazy and Winterguard or Nyss Hunters and abuse Iron Flesh (and sometimes Weald Secrets). It's not just high DEF or high ARM you can skew a list with. The 42 doomreavers list (Epic Zoktavir theme force) is a skew list. Pretty much all double Colossal lists are skew lists, you won't get the same offensive power out of two colossals as you will almost anything else but if your opponent can't deal with two colossals you'll win and while most lists can deal with one colossal as it stands probably the majority cannot deal with two. 

You still need to be able to deal with:

• Heavies

• Infantry

• High ARM

• High DEF

Mostly though you are trying to ask your opponent a question. If you are making things difficult to kill they need to be as difficult to kill as possible. If you are going for a swarm of something it needs to be as big as possible. Go for overkill, an ARM 22 Galleon is probably going to be very difficult to kill but an ARM 24 Galleon is going to be impossible for most armies and that's what your skew list needs to aim for. 

Example

Trollbloods
Standard Army
PCs: 50 / 50
17 models

[00] Madrak Ironhide, Thornwood Chieftain (0 / 6 WB)
[12]  >> Mulg the Ancient
[10]  >> Earthborn Dire Troll
[10]  >> Dire Troll Bomber
[09]  >> Dire Troll Mauler
[06]  >> Troll Axer
[03] Janissa Stonetide
[02] Troll Whelps
[03] Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes (3 grunts)
[01]  >> Stone Scribe Elder

Madrak has sure foot so a model and all models within 3" get +2 DEF. The earthborn animus gives me +2 ARM when in 3" of a wall and Janissa gives me a wall that I can place wherever I want. The wall also gives me cover against shooting (another +4 DEF) and +2 DEF if you are striking me in melee over the obstacle. The Krielstone gives me another +2 ARM and I end up with 4 heavies on anywhere between DEF 14 and 18, ARM 22 or 23, with whelps, snacking and regeneration to heal them back up. The Bomber and Axer kill infantry and I have two big AOEs so high DEF isn't a big problem. The Mauler has a great strength buff as do the stones and the Earthborn and Mulg are high P+S to start with. Madrak's feat allows models to move an inch and attack again for free whenever they kill a model and he can give them +2 to hit. The only real problem with the list is that I can't get elemental communication on the Axer so it is only ARM 20. Poor little Axer, he never gets any love, he doesn't even have a chicken.

There aren't a lot of armies that can deal with 4 ARM 22 or higher heavies, particularly when they also have to contend with mostly DEF 16 and also need reach to attack at least two of the beasts in melee. Of course if your opponent has enough buffs to get over that hurdle then you have 4 slow beasts, only one of which has reach and they only need to remove 5 models to defeat the list. A good example of a counter to this list is Kreoss1. Purification lowers all your ARM by 2 (except on the earthborn) and gets rid of sure foot (lowers DEF by 2 and can be knocked down). You can then use your knockdown feat to shoot Madrak or just beat  a few heavies out of the game with your choir buffs. 

List Building Again

This is another post borne out of a dicussion at the club. The comment put to me was that there is a tendency towards trying to take "premium" models rather than something more along the lines of "I like this model I'll try it out". There is really nothing wrong with building towards models that you like both in a casual and a competitive sense. I was a bit thrown by the comment and it took me a while to pin down why, it's because I don't build lists like that anymore. I don't build a list by asking what are the best models with this caster I instead come up with a way I want the list to work and then pick models to do a job in the list.

I'll try and explain with the help of a list I have refined and am pretty happy with, my Madrak2 list. I'm picking him because I ended up playing him very differently from the way I played him the first time I put him on the table.

Madrak2
My second favourite troll caster. Your caster's abilities are going to be key when deciding what you want your list to do Madrak has a couple of important ones

Blood Fury - Additional damage dice for model/unit. Better on units because they have more attacks for the same spell cost so put out more damage.

Desperate Hour (Feat) - Everyone instantly makes a thresher attack that only targets enemy models. Works with blood fury.

Grim Salvation - If you hurt Madrak you instead remove a warrior model from within 1" of him. Unless it's a Musician or Standard Bearer or Weapon Attachment in which case they can pass it on to someone within 1" of them.

Warpath - Whenever you kill a model in his control a warbeast in his battlegroup can move 3".

When I started with him one of the first things I took was Mulg. Seemed like a high MAT reach beast with the feat was a good idea and Mulg's only drawback is his low SPD which is fixed by warpath. I also had an Earthborn and Janissa so I could being up his ARM and keep him safe, figuring the Earthborn would also get a lot out of warpath. The problem is that is a lot of points (At some stage there was a mauler in here too but I can't remember if I ever had all three together), these are points you can't use on troops. Points that do much less attacking on the feat, points that get less value out of blood fury, points that do not help keep Madrak alive. So the list was altered. I dropped one and then both heavies and started to have a plan for the list rather than a bunch of models I thought would be good.

The plan was a pretty simple one: Surround Madrak with infantry so he is unkillable. Alpha strike (or let your opponent alpha a tarpit unit then counter) and feat with blood fury killing everything.

In order to carry out this plan I need: reach for the feat, speed for the alpha strike, a way to deliver stuff for the alpha strike, I want a hit buff (so I hit on all my weaponmaster, reach, thresher attacks). I also need some beasts but I don't want many, the infantry will do the heavy lifting so the beasts should be able to contribute to the battle from relative safety.

Good units for this plan:

Kriel Warriors (you can take a weapon attachment with reach and they are cheap to stand around Madrak, they can go faster or hit harder and more accurately)
Borrowers (no reach but fast and high pow to abuse blood fury, also very cheap and will always make it alive)
Long Riders (fast and reach and hit hard and high MAT but expensive)
Fennblades (fast and reach)

I can take any three at 50 points. All have their own justifications there are no right or wrong answers. Burrowers are one of my favourite units so they are in, they always make it to the battle too, guaranteed as they can burrow. They also can't benefit from the feat which is good because it means I can cycle blood fury to them after the feat and I don't lose anything. Fennblades are a big unit with reach which is fantastic for the feat and the Kriel Warriors add to numbers to keep Madrak alive and I can put them in front of the more important Fennblades. If I take a Runebearer (Moses) I can upkeep blood fury on the Kriels, charge and kill stuff, runebearer it onto the fenns, charge and kill, feat and kill more stuff, have Madrak cast blood fury onto the burrowers and they can kill anything still standing. I need a fell caller so the Burrowers can hit and I want a second fell caller for the Fenns as they are going to be making a shitload of attacks (I've made more than 30 attack rolls in a single turn with them).

The burrowers don't need any help getting to the enemy but the fenns and kriels do, so add a krielstone to make them pretty much immune to blast damage and immune to fire and corrosion (KS elder). Since I have so much infantry I'll take a chronicler too as he can give them concealment and his best ability, if you kill a model in melee you get knocked down which makes it very hard to get through the unit and means the survivors will kill everything next turn as well.

I need some beasts with ranged abilities and or useful animus as they are going to stay back, I want ranged stuff in particular so I can kill annoying models my opponent has left in front of his army to disrupt the charge. The Impaler means Madrak can shoot 12" with his axe which is good and it has a good ranged attack. The Pyre's animus gives me a damage buff (always love a damage buff) and immunity to fire makes Madrak even more unkillable. That's 47 points, the last 3 points are a Thrullg if it's a tournament list (stays back removing offensive upkeeps until the late game) or Janissa if it's not. Janissa is a lot better than the Thrullg for this list but I tend to run Madrak2, Doomshaper2 and I need Janissa in my Doomshaper2 list.

Trollbloods
Standard Army
PCs: 50 / 50
52 models

[00] Madrak Ironhide, World Ender (0 / 5 WB)
[02]  >> Trollkin Runebearer
[05]  >> Pyre Troll
[05]  >> Troll Impaler
[03] Janissa Stonetide
[03] Fell Caller Hero
[03] Fell Caller Hero
[02] Stone Scribe Chronicler
[04] Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes (5 grunts)
[01]  >> Stone Scribe Elder
[06] Kriel Warriors (9 grunts)
[02]  >> Kriel Warrior Standard & Piper
[03]  >> Kriel Warrior Caber Thrower (3 Caber Throwers)
[06] Pyg Burrowers (9 grunts)
[08] Trollkin Fennblades (9 grunts)
[02]  >> Trollkin Fennblade Officer & Drummer


A few more things and then I'll shut up. I've seen a lot of Madrak with Champions. Madrak is great with champions, blood fury makes gives them 5 dice on the charge and 4 dice on their second attack. If they hit a heavy it disintegrates but they never hit a heavy. They spend the whole match killing Legionnaires and slowly dying to ravagore shots until I can finish them off with a Scythean.  That said I've also seen Madrak with champions as a second wave unit where the fennblades and burrowers kill anything that can take ARM 20 champions and the champions then just chomp through the rest of the rest of the army while puny infantry just bounce off. The plan is more important than the models. What do they do? why are they in the list?

Lastly you need a plan for how you are going to spend your focus/fury. This can be as simple as camp the lot or Caine shoots stuff. Here I want Blood Fury on 3 things so I need the Runebearer to cycle it. When the runebearer is not using his once per game spell casting ability (stupid Skarlock Thralls) that'll mean Madrak has 3 fury left. He's got plenty to top up the krielstone or snipe and throw his axe. He does not need to camp a lot of fury as his troops keep him alive. You need to remember if you want your caster to cast a lot of animi or if you need to fuel jacks and cast spells that you need a plan for how you are going to spend your focus.

This may make no sense, I'm very tired. I may put up a post about different things I build lists to do at some point.

List Building - Madrak

Trollbloods
Standard Army
PCs: 35 / 35
15 models

[00] Madrak Ironhide, Thornwood Chieftain (0 / 6 WB)
[12]  >> Mulg the Ancient
[09]  >> Dire Troll Mauler
[03] Trollkin Champion Hero
[03] Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes (3 grunts)
[01]  >> Stone Scribe Elder
[10] Trollkin Champions (4 grunts)
[03]  >> Skaldi Bonehammer

I think we need one more example, this is a list built not around a caster but around a tactic, that tactic has the rather unexciting name of "the brick" and it's about as hard as one. It's almost the polar opposite of the Doomshaper list and makes a good second army for steamroller tournaments for that reason. So what's in the army and why:

Madrak - Small control range is not a big issue as this army stays close together. His feat allows every model to advance 1" and make an additional attack whenever they kill a model with a melee attack. He has a spell Carnage which adds +2 to melee hit rolls. His other spells are good too but not so important in making the list. He has 5 Fury so you want enough beasts to generate that even when you have lost your biggest one. His feat and spells mean you are looking at the melee beasts.

Mulg - simply the best troll beast. High MAT and high P+S + reach. Will destroy whole units with ease on feat turn and anything else at any time. Protective fit means that as long as he is close to your warlock anything attempting to harm your warlock will have to kill him first or be willing to sacrifice itself. His slow speed is irrelevant as this is a defensive list. 

Mauler - Not only is the mauler a force of destruction but it has a strength boosting animus. That's the important thing here that distinguishes him from the Earthborn. Sometimes you need the ability to hit harder than is entirely sensible and the other strength boosting beasts are shooters. 

Any more beasts and we'll need to take whelps for fury management so lets move onto units

Krielstone - This makes the list. It'll give you +2 ARM to everything and immunity to continuous effects or +1 Strength or no incorporeal models. That will put your beasts at ARM 20 and 21 and your champions at ARM 20 as well. With your entire front line at ARM 20 or greater your opponent will find it very difficult to kill anything with infantry and jacks and beasts will struggle to do much damage without strength boosts. 

Champions - In because of their high ARM and multiple wounds. Skaldi gives the overtake and pathfinder on a charge (both very useful) and the solo lets them walk through each other. This generally means you want to have Skaldi behind the unit and them have him countercharge through the unit. The solo has reach and thresher and weapons master. A very nasty combination. 

What you get is a list with an ARM 20 front line equivalent MAT 9 or better except for the Mauler which fights like MAT 8 and high POW or POW 12 weapon masters. And on feat turn every kill means another step forward and another attack. It's slow but most things bounce off it so it doesn't mind going second. The only problem is that it does not split up very well other than that it is a very difficult list to fight. 

List Building - another example

More on list building this time with my other favourite caster epic Doomshaper. Since I've already gone through the basics I'll start with my list and then explain it.

Trollbloods
Standard Army
PCs: 35 / 35
8 models

[00] Hoarluk Doomshaper, Rage of Dhunia (0 / 6 WB)
[12]  >> Mulg the Ancient
[10]  >> Earthborn Dire Troll
[09]  >> Dire Troll Mauler
[06]  >> Troll Axer
[03] Janissa Stonetide
[01] Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew

eDoomshaper is in many ways the exact opposite of eCaine, his feat only helps beasts, his spells only help beasts, and he has two abilities that work with beasts. He offers nothing to troops. It should not be surprising then that his list is composed entirely of beasts.

Why those beasts though? Mulg is without a doubt the best troll beast, he has reach, ridiculous P+S on his main weapon, magic weapon (rare for a beast) but even more he has an affinity for doomshaper that will allow him to make an extra attack for free if the thing he is smacking is not dead yet. Also doomshaper is able to cast the animus of a dire troll for free, Mulg's animus is meaningless for this ability as eDoomshaper should not be close enough to the enemy for it to do anything.

That leaves the other dire trolls. eDoomshaper's feat and wild aggression both work for melee beasts so that leans you towards the earthborn and the mauler, also the bombers animus is not particularly useful for an all beast army (no blast damage for one model and those B2B) and the Blizters has a range of self and again Doomshaper should not be close enough to the enemy to use it. So again doomshaper's synergies point you towards the Earthborn and Mauler. I've taken one of each. The Mauler has a great offensive animus and the Earthborn a great defensive animus. The Mauler is a more general beatstick but the Earthborn is able to use the POW of your opponents weapons which makes it great for destroying casters especially with Wild aggression (which boosts to hit rolls, casters tend to have high DEF and high POW weapons).

Next the Axer. Mulg's feat and if needed the earthborn animus is often enough to give you all the charge distance you need but just in case you can throw in the axer too. If gives you extra movement and pathfinder so you can get your beasts across rough terrain as well as giving them a greater threat range. The other thing that is great about the axer is reach and thresher. It will destroy infantry and it can be run light on fury to give Doomshaper something to transfer damage to, it also benefits from eDoomshaper's feat.

Janissa has rock wall. This is one of the best abilities in the game. Put it right in front of a beast and you cannot charge that beast unless you have reach and you get bonus DEF against enemies shooting or stabbing over the wall, put it further away and you can't charge unless you have pathfinder and it gives you a ready made obstacle for elemental communication (which the earthborn can give other models with it's animus) which gives you bonus ARM. In this list she is here to put a rock wall in front of two of the beasts (it only fits that many), have eDoomshaper give out the earthborn animus and have everything +2 ARM.

Swamp Gobbers. I had one point left over. Swamp gobbers can smokescreen your caster (and maybe Janissa too). It's an extra layer of protection for your caster.

In addition to the obvious stuff this list has some tricks. Refuge Mulg into a very threatening position (preferably into melee with your opponents caster) and force your opponent to use all his heavy destroying resources to destroy him leaving your real assassin the Earthborn safe. Goad, Wild aggression and Rage on the Earthborn should be enough to destroy all but the most heavily protected caster. Alternately Refuge one of your heavies back behind Janissa's wall.

List building

So I thought I'd share my thoughts on list building for the benefit of the new players in this campaign. Warmachine is a game of synergies, if you pick models individually without paying attention to how they interact then you will find yourself at a distinct disadvantage.

The best place to start building a list is with your caster. Look at their spells, abilities and feat and think about what units work best with that caster, what units you intend to cast individual spells on and if there are any units you can use which will aid your caster.

For this example I'm going to use one of my favourite casters, epic Caine. Epic Caine's feat is that for every shot he hits with subesquent shots do more damage. Therefore to get the most out of his feat he wants any models that will allow him extra shots. In particular the squire and Reinholdt, he will also need all his focus that turn to buy extra shots.

eCaine (the e is for epic) has no spells that specifically benefit jacks, 6 Focus (which is on the low side) and wants that focus for his feat and for shooting/spells. Therefore he wants only a small number of jacks and in particular jacks that can run effectively with a low amount of focus or marshalled jacks. I would try to keep to one jack in his battlegroup and any other jacks marshalled. Also you want to avoid focus hungry jacks like the Charger and Thunderhead and steer towards jacks that generate their own focus like the Stormclad and Gallant and focus efficient jacks like the Hunter. You also want to avoid jacks with weaknessess, the Hammersmith is a great melee jack but is very slow and does not have reach so otften is destroyed before it can let loose. With a caster who has spells that let that allow you to make a jack faster (eHaley, Kraye) the hammersmith becomes a much better jack but with eCaine it should be avoided.

eCaine also gets +5 range to spells when he doesn't arc them and due to his fantastic shooting wants to be close to the enemy anyway so eCaine does not need an Arcnode (no lancer or Thorn)

That's enough about what he doesn't want what does he want? He gives all gun mages gunfighter and has the spell blur. Blur gives a bonus to DEF which does not count for melee attacks and so works wonderfully well on a high DEF shooting unit. Gun mages are therefore a great choice. The UA for gunmages makes them more effective and passes on his special shot abilities to any jack he controls. As eCaine is very focus hungry and gives no benefits to jacks he controls a marshalled jack is a great idea for him. Therefore you should consider marshalling a shooting jack to the gun mages. There are 6 choices, the charger gets a benefit from using focus which a marshal cannot allocate, the sentinel and thunderhead use mostly special attacks which the gun mage bonus cannot count for so you are left with the defender, hunter and cyclone. I personally favour the hunter, the other jacks can do well in melee and would in that case like more focus, they are also more expensive.

Heightened reflexes lets you avoid being knocked down or made stationary. This is another spell that favours high DEF units as those are the two most common ways to drop DEF. It's also particularly useful for a tough unit as it means that models that pass a tough roll are not knocked down and activate normally.

Magic Bullet gives you free damage to a nearby model when you hit a model. It therefore wants a shooting model with high RAT (so that you are likely to hit). eCaine does this himself.

You want to make sure your list has a plan to deal with heavy jacks and high DEF infantry. In a campaign setting like this you can have multiple lists but even then you can come up against both in the same battle. You want some melee and some shooting in case your opponent has some way to reduce the effectiveness of one of those options and something to take and hold objectives.

So here is a sample annotated list:

Cygnar
Standard Army
PCs: 35 / 35
22 models

[00] Captain Allister Caine (0 / 5 WJ remaining)
[02]  >> Squire - extra focus is always good but here means an extra feat shot.
[10]  >> Stormclad - gets a focus from the stormblades provides much needed melee
[06] Arcane Tempest Gun Mages - blur. Push stuff off objectives, shred infantry
[02]  >> Arcane Tempest Gun Mage Officer - gun mages get true sight (really useful) and marshalled jack
[06]  >> Hunter - +4" range, extra damage on critical or push from the officer
[05] Stormblade Infantry - adds needed melee option and gives the stormclad a focus. Heightened reflexes.
[03]  >> Stormblade Infantry Officer & Standard - assault and 3" AOE makes stormblades very deadly
[02] Rhupert Carvolo, Piper of Ord - gives the stormblades tough, and they cannot be knocked down thanks to heightened reflexes
[03] Eiryss, Angel of Retribution - Helps eCaine assassinate
[01] Reinholdt, Gobber Speculator - extra shot every turn for eCaine.

Because of the synergies in this list the gunmages DEF 18 from shooting and gunfighter lets them fight back if charged. The stormblades are tough, fearless and not knocked down when they pass a tough roll. The hunter gets +4" range (or push) and a boost from the jack marshal, it only needs one boost because it mostly shoots jacks/beasts. On feat turn eCain has two initial shots, one from Reinholdt, 6 from regular focus and one from the squire for a total of 10 shots making the last shot POW 21. When possible these should all be at your opponents caster. Push things out of the way with your gun mages, have Eiryss get rid of any defensive spells and then kill the caster. Everything works with something else and that's what makes the list good.